Gang of Four announce 2014 Australian tour

Gang of Four are returning to Australia to celebrate the 35th anniversary of their classic album Entertainment! along with all the hits that followed!Entertainment! was a rare bird for its time, an enthralling amalgam of punk, funk and angular rock that signalled a changing-of-the-guard ushering in of the post- punk era. Released in 1979, this spiky collection of danceable songs would go on to inspire a generation - stripped of excess flesh, it revealed a twitching skeleton rising against apathy and commodity. The influence of Entertainment! is still being felt in music today. To celebrate 35 years since its release, Gang of Four will perform the entire album in full and all the hits that followed across Australia in 2014. Gang of Four is one of the most radical, and radically important, rock groups of the last 30 years. Formed in Leeds in 1976, Gang of Four first performed in May 1977. All the big bands that followed, the Chili Peppers, INXS, R.E.M., U2, have spoken of their debt to Gang of Four but in more recent years, the band’s influence has become almost universal with the emergence of post-punk influenced bands such as the Rapture, Radio 4, Futureheads, Nine Inch Nails, Franz Ferdinand and Bloc Party. The band is led by guitarist, songwriter and vocalist Andy Gill, widely acclaimed as an innovator and much copied around the world. Fuelled by the fury of punk rock and radical political theory, Gang of Four successfully welded the two in an inspired display of polemics and music that addressed the vagaries of life in the modern world (including love and romance) as matters of political inquiry. Despite the fact that this sounds rife with the potential for being long on rhetoric and short on groove, such was not the case. What made Gang of Four's polemical clang 'n' roll so compelling was that it worked as harsh, bracing, and ultimately liberating rock & roll. Gang of Four are currently working on a new album, which will be released in 2014.